Divya Deshmukh and R Vaishali are both not new to being giantkillers at a huge FIDE event. They split the FIDE Women’s World Cup and Women’s Grand Swiss titles, despite neither of them being among the favourites to win those tournaments.
When the FIDE Women’s Candidates tournament kicks off in Cyprus on Sunday, both Divya and Vaishali begin as rank outsiders to take the title, and with it, the status of challenger to the women’s world championship crown currently held by China’s Ju Wenjun.
However, both Indian players can be the proverbial Davids in a field of Goliaths at the Candidates.
How will Divya follow up a landmark year?
At the start of the women’s World Cup last year, Divya didn’t even have a Grandmaster norm. At the end of it, she had the World Cup trophy, along with the Grandmaster title, and a Candidates spot.
That remarkable run to the title involved beating fancied players along the way. Two of those players will be at the Candidates too – the Chinese duo of Zhu Jiner and Tan Zhongyi. It would’ve been three, had Koneru Humpy not pulled out of the tournament citing concerns over safety due to the ongoing tensions in the Middle East.
With her spot at the Candidates confirmed, Divya set about playing in a few open tournaments (competing against men) at the back end of the year, including the Grand Swiss and the World Cup in Goa. At the Grand Swiss, Divya did hold her own in an extremely competitive field. She scored 5 points in 11 rounds and, despite being by far the lowest- rated player at the tournament, beat a couple of players rated over 2600, and most notably held world champion Gukesh Dommaraju to a draw in a marathon six-hour game.
It’s these kinds of experiences that she’s gained in the last year that Divya will bank upon to give her a competitive edge at the Candidates. Her rating compared to the rest of the field means that she’s not really a favourite to win this tournament, but many would’ve said the same before the World Cup as well.
Divya Deshmukh has prior experience of not paying heed to pre-tournament predictions, so write her off at your own peril.
Will prior Candidates experience help Vaishali?
Vaishali may not even have played the women’s Grand Swiss, which she won, without the intervention of her brother R Praggnanandhaa and GM Karthikeyan Murali as she was dealing with a hit to her confidence after a string of poor results. That Grand Swiss was great for Vaishali, and she followed that up later in the year with an impressive fifth-place finish at the World Rapid Championships. However, 2025 was a year that brought her little other cheer.
But Vaishali’s been at the Candidates stage before and has put on a creditable show in that previous appearance. She finished fourth in 2024, and that was after she’d finished level on points with Humpy and Lei Tingjie, who finished second and third. They all finished 1.5 points behind eventual winner Tan Zhongyi.
An indifferent 2025 outside of the Grand Swiss victory means that Vaishali is the lowest-rated player at the tournament this year. Like Divya, she has the ability to turn the tables on higher-ranked opponents on our day, but the ratings don’t lie.
If Vaishali can find a consistency and attacking edge to her game, that deserted her too often in 2025, she can still have a chance.
